I. Field of the Disclosure
This disclosure relates generally to complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) devices, and more specifically, to implementing CMOS devices for radio-frequency (RF) applications and circuits.
II. Background
Many electronic devices include a modem that enables communication of data via a wireless network. As users and applications of devices consume increasing amounts of data through wireless networks, network providers and equipment manufacturers have strived to increase data rates to improve end user experience. Conventional methods for increasing data rates of devices include increasing transmit power or size of a communication carrier that is available to a device for communication via a wireless network.
Due to government regulations and/or industry standards, however, increasing transmit power and carrier bandwidth are no longer viable options to increase data rates. Transmission power limits are typically restricted due to safety and interference concerns, and saturation of the wireless spectrum has fragmented or reduced available carriers. As such, some wireless providers implement carrier aggregation schemes in which multiple carriers, such as three (3) or five (5) different carriers, are combined to provide a larger aggregate carrier or “pipe” to support desired data rates.
To implement device-side carrier aggregation, the device's modem communicates over adjacent carriers, non-adjacent carriers, or carriers in different frequency bands. Thus, to facilitate carrier aggregation, radio-frequency (RF) hardware of a device's modem needs to support communication over many different combinations of carriers and frequency bands. Conventionally, switches and multiplexers have been added to the RF hardware of the modem to enable signal routing for this multi-carrier and/or multi-band communication. The added switches and multiplexers, however, often suffer from non-linearity or poor isolation, which results in signal attenuation or interference.